Joshua Radin

Joshua Radin is like a lot of singer-songwriters in the age of post-Garden State pop music: an Elliott Smith/John Mayer hybrid, with a dash of Nick Drake thrown in for good measure. Born and raised in Shaker Heights, a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, Radin attended Chicago's Northwestern University. There he majored in painting and drawing. He also befriended hip dude Zach Braff. After graduation Radin explored a series of dead-end jobs before trying his hand at songwriting and recording. Braff took an instant liking to his pal's hushed brand of acoustic pop and featured a handful of his tunes, including the hit "Winter," on the actor's television series Scrubs. This, of course, led to the much-talked-about "Zach Braff effect," with more of Radin's work appearing on the shows Brothers and Sisters, Grey's Anatomy, One Tree Hill and more. Columbia Records then came knocking and quickly dropped his debut album, We Were Here, in 2006. Just two short years later, Radin found himself performing at Ellen DeGeneres' and Portia de Rossi's wedding. And a couple months after that, Radin dropped his sophomore effort, Simple Times.